I'm your host, Jester. I've been an EVE Online player for about six years. One of my four mains is Ripard Teg, pictured at left. Sadly, I've succumbed to "bittervet" disease, but I'm wandering the New Eden landscape (and from time to time, the MMO landscape) in search of a cure.You can follow along, if you want...

Wednesday, May 23, 2012

FOTW: Incursion Shield Apoc Navy Issue

I haven't done an incursion ship in a while, so let's do one of those. These days, in the incursion HQ fleets, snipers are very trendy. And given the length some of those HQ fleets take to run a site, it can be advantageous to limit your ammo expenses. That means lasers. The Nightmare is an obvious choice but nearly as good is a well-fit and -flown Apocalypse Navy Issue:

Large Anti-Thermal Screen Reinforcer II
Large Core Defense Field Extender I
Large Core Defense Field Extender I

Hobgoblin II x5
Ogre II x2
Hammerhead II x2
Hobgoblin II x1

A shield Apoc? It actually makes more sense than you think. Though the armor buffer is thick, the Apoc gets no particular bonuses to armor resists so there's nothing stopping you from shield tanking it. Use the standard shield tank from my Incursion guide and it meets the minimums very handily with 70% resists across the board and 17000 shield HP when receiving fleet bonuses. With fleet resists, it goes higher still. That's quite sufficient for any HQ site even under higher Sansha influence. If you're concerned about the tank, buff it a bit more by replacing one of the T2 invuls for a single faction or C-type Invul. That will push your resists past 75%, a number many dedicated shield boats will envy.

That leaves you with seven non-tank low slots, which will make your Apoc very happy. To fit the Tachyon Beam Lasers you'll need as a sniper, you'll need two Power Diagnostic Systems. Make one of them a faction PDS or use a 1% power grid implant to make the guns fit. As a pair of bonuses, the PDSs both increase your buffer past 18000 shield HP and increase your capacitor. The remaining five lows can be used for any combination of Heat Sinks, faction Heat Sinks, and Tracking Enhancers you like. The fit I recommend strikes a good balance between DPS and cost. The Sebo will be required to boost the Apoc's targeting range past the 140 kilometers that an incursion sniper is expected to operate at.

DPS ranges from about 525 at full sniper range to 600 at 100 kilometers or so to 800+ at 50 kilometers. Carry Aurora, Standard, and Multifrequency crystals for those three ranges, respectively. If you want a 75km crystal, you can carry some Xrays as well. Finally, carry some Gleam for 850 DPS at close range. These numbers are equal or superior to most other sniper ships, notably all but the most high skill point missile snipers. And like all gunships and unlike missile ships, your DPS lands instantly.

Using this ship properly is about managing capacitor. Whenever possible, use the Standard crystals. Not only do these offer the best long-range DPS, you will be completely cap stable while firing Standards. If you're asked to fire at closer or longer range, however, you're going to have to be more careful about cap. First, this ship should be flown with a 'Squire' Energy Management EM implant of at least the 3% variety. Snipers only draw Sansha aggro rarely. As a result, if you're watchful, you can manage cap by keeping one or more hardeners inactive and activate them as your ship is yellow-boxed. Do not wait for red boxes! This will allow you to dedicate more cap to your guns.

Group your guns in either two groups or three groups. If you are aggro'ed by a large percentage of Sansha ships, as you activate your hardeners, feel free to shut off one or more gun groups. This will both allow you to concentrate capacitor on your hardeners, and the reduced DPS coming from your ship will encourage the Sansha ships to attack elsewhere. Once they do, you can again cautiously deactivate a hardener and put your cap back into guns. Of course, you can solve the problem more permanently by either begging for cap from the Logistics pilots periodically or simply replacing one of your five damage/tracking mods with a single Capacitor Power Relay. You can also supplement a bit with Synth Mindflood boosters if you like.

If you're running HQ sites for The Valhalla Project public channel, 98% of the time you'll launch five Hobgoblin IIs and Assist them to the "drone bunny" in the site. This person's job is to use the drones assigned to him to quickly destroy frigate threats. The remaining five drones you're carrying are for special situations in three of the HQ sites described below.

In addition to plenty of spare crystals, carry an Experimental 100MN Afterburner and a Signal Amplifier II in your cargo bay. There are three types of HQ sites and the mom site that you will run in this ship. For the True Creation Research Center (TCRC), Nation Rebirth Facility (NRF), and the mom site, you'll use the fitting above. For the True Power Provisional Headquarters (TPPH), you'll be instructed to fit an Afterburner. Replace your Sebo with the Experimental version. You probably won't have the grid to fit the Tech 2 version, but it's not needed in any case. The Experimental version will push your ship at 300+m/s, which is plenty for this site. There's also a minimum of true sniper targets in the TPPH, so you don't really need the Sebo. If you do find it's a problem, replace one of your damage/tracking mods temporarily with the Signal Amp.

In the TPPH, TCRC, and mom site, you'll be attacking a large stationary target. This will be the mom itself in the third site, a large Sansha battle tower in the other two. This is why you brought the heavier drones and the Gleam crystals. If you are in a position to approach this station or the mom at a range of 25km or closer, go ahead and switch to the Gleam ammo. If you're asked to put drones on the mom or station, swap out your flight of Hob2s for the mixed drone group, which does about 100 more DPS.

Gun snipers are currently very welcome additions to incursion fleets. The laser boat allows you to participate in this activity without spending a larger percentage of your gain on ammo. Like all laser boats, cap management is the trickiest part. But if you carefully manage that, you'll have a long-range incursion boat to be proud of.

Incursion safe!

All Fits of the Week are intended as general guidelines only. You
may not have the skills needed for this exact fit. If you do not, feel
free to adjust the fit to suit to meet your skills, including using meta
3 guns and "best named" defenses and e-war. Ships can also be adjusted
to use faction or dead-space modules depending on the budget of the
pilot flying it. Each FOTW is intended as a general guide to introduce
you to concepts that will help you fit and to fly that particular type
of ship more aggressively and well.

Truly inspiring Jester! This looks extremely fun to fly as well, which counts far more than many give will give credit to. Finally, being able to pocket more of the isk at the end, due to the lack of ammo-expenditure is icing on the cake (even if the cake IS a lie).

Caveat: I've not done assault sites, so I don't know how much buffer is needed, but what would happen if you swapped a CDFE for a CCC rig (less buffer, less sig, improved cap recharge)?

Have you thought about replacing the entire drone bay with a flight of 4 Garde IIs (or 3 Garde IIs and 5 hob IIs)? I realise sentries have tracking issues at close range, but they have good range, good damage, and no flight time delay.

Nothing like posting ship fits for an obsolete in-game activity, eh? I bought a Navy Apoc a week before the nerf. Can't be arsed to use it. Incursions are dead as a popular, profitable and fun activity.

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